Letter to the Editor Re: 2018 and the return of politics
Most often people who comments on the performance of President Muhammadu Buhari’s government seem to have forgotten the depth of the rot we came out from in 2015. People feel that with the coming of PMB, all the problems we inherited from the previous misrule would disappear. This man, for God’s sake is only human. There is very limited achievement he could be expected to get despite the campaign promises made.
Before we judge people we should put ourselves in their shoes. How much have we as individuals achieved in our affairs in the past years? Have we soon forgotten where we came from in May 2015? The security situation was so frightening that elections had to be delayed for 6 weeks. Travelling our roads was a nightmare with all the security checks and road blocks all over our towns and roads at least here in the North. Every gathering of people was scary. The motor parks, churches, mosques etc were targets of suicide bombers. Worshippers queue up for checks before they are allowed into prayer premises. All these have become something of the past. Of course suicide bombings still take place even in the advanced countries.
People forget that as one problem is solved, there are always tendencies for subsidiary ones to emerge. The economic hardship being experienced is part of the complications of the policies being adopted. I believe that if it were the previous Government, it would simply have gone into more and more scandalous borrowings to finance governance when foreign exchange became very scarce immediately the new government was sworn in. I tend to still believe that that foreign exchange scarcity in the mid 2015 was deliberately caused by the sympathisers of the previous government who had hoarded the billions of dollars doled out to them to buy electoral victory.
People should always try to be objective and realistic in assessing this government. It takes courageous patriotism and discipline to navigate through the mess and devastation that was created and nourished over 16 years period of selfish, clueless and incompetent governance. Having lost the elections, the sympathisers of the previous government simply wanted to destroy what was left of the devastation that was hoisted on the new government of PMB.
And talking about fighting corruption, if this government has not achieve much at least it has stopped the massive and wanton pilferage of our commonwealth. The recoveries of some of the lootings of the previous government should be appreciated. If we did not get the change of government, there would never be any question of recovering what had already been looted and shared out as largesee to the thieving party supporters and sympathisers. Of course the lootings would have continued with more sophistication. We honestly wouldn’t know where we would be today. If despite everything that was done so far to recover Nigeria from the rot that we had been, and we are still where we are today, it is best to imagine what our position would have been if no efforts were made at all.
We as Nigerians should learn to appreciate the little mercies we get from God, changing our destiny from the eminent collapse we were headed for in the 16 years of misrule of the previous government to where we are today. We must appreciate God for His mercies to us so that He can do more for us.
Alhassan Ungo, alhassanungo@gmail.com